National Legal and Policy Center -- Organized Labor Accountability Project
 
UNION CORRUPTION UPDATE
 
June 10, 2002 -- Vol. 5, Issue 12

For Influential Leaders & Important Decision Makers:
Information on America's most corrupt & aggressive unions

 IRON WORKERS (IAIW)
Accounting Partner Pleads Guilty
Mirroring the the Enron-Authur Andersen scandal, a partner in the union accounting firm of Thomas Havey LLP confessed June 6 to two felony counts arising from an ongoing criminal probe into the Int'l Ass'n of Iron Workers and its Nat'l Ironworkers & Employers Apprenticeship Training & Journeyman Upgrading Fund. Havey partner Alfred S. Garappolo pled guilty to one count of accessory after the fact to embezzlement and one count of concealing a material fact. Garappolo, who worked in Havey's Washington, D.C. office, admitted that from Jan. 1999 to July 2001 he helped Kerry J. Tresselt, bookkeeper of a union training fund conceal her embezzlement of some $350,000 payroll checks from the Fund in 1998. Tresselt also happens to be the daughter of the ex-trustee of the Fund, Raymond J. Robertson, who is also ex-general vice-president of IAIW.

Garappolo, a Md. resident, also admitted concealing the amount of money the union spent on entertainment expenses for IAIW president emeritus Jacob "Jake" West and others. Garappolo is the ninth individual to be charged in the growing scandal. Six other union bosses or employees including, Robertson and Tresselt, have pled guilty. West and ex-IAIW general secretary LeRoy Worley have been indicted and are awaiting trial. [Wash. Post 6/7/02] West has also been linked to the Ullico, Inc. insider trading scandal. For more details on the Tresselt scheme, see http://www.nlpc.org/olap/UCU3/05_11_03.htm.

Union Corruption Update is made possible by the generous contributions from readers like you. NLPC, PO Box 6821, Falls Church, VA 22040. Thank you.

In addition to the unions and organizations covered in this Union Corruption Update, readers can look forward to news and information on other corrupt and abusive unions in future editions.

All back issues of the Union Corruption Update can be viewed at NLPC's website (http://www.nlpc.org).  Also available is a union-by-union and state-by-state index of all Union Corruption Update articles.

If you have story ideas or suggestions for future editions of Union Corruption Update, please email NLPC at nlpc@nlpc.org.  Thank you.

Union Corruption Update is part of NLPC's Organized Labor Accountability Project which is investigating and exposing corruption in the Teamsters, LIUNA, AFL-CIO and many other union organizations. NLPC is a nonpartisan, nonprofit foundation promoting ethics and accountability in government through research, education and legal action.

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